


Leaving It Behind

by Merfilly



Category: DCU Animated
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-05
Updated: 2006-08-05
Packaged: 2017-12-04 14:44:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/711891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A different take on events following <em>Star-Crossed</em> in which John almost loses the future he saw.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Leaving It Behind

Mari throws it all in Shayera’s face, and Shayera just keeps taking the punishment. Only J’onn seemed to understand that this was Shayera’s hair shirt, her atonement ritual. The others of the original seven merely avoided adding to her pain and misery, or just plain avoided her.

John refused to see just how hard it hurt his former girlfriend. He could never be sure when he realized he did not hate her for her betrayal anymore. He only realized it, and his stupidity, when she left the League.

The fact Shayera knew about Rex had always been his safety valve, that feeling that he could count on her to be there. IF that future was supposed to come to pass, then he had to do nothing. Mari and he would have their relationship, and eventually something would come to pass to put him back with Shayera. Until the morning he reported in and found a new seventh had to be voted on, because she was gone, he didn't know he had counted on it, even if only in his subconscious.

He makes it through the meeting that confirmed Black Canary to the Big Seven, then kind of fumbles his way to the commissary to get some coffee. Somewhere along the line that idea crumbles into a need to rush off into space to find her.

“She’s not out there.” Batman’s low voice actually scares half a year off John’s life, as he contemplates which sector she might have gone to.

“Where did she go?” the ex-marine asks, turning to the shadow-dweller.

“Her home on Earth. She’s gone native, and she’s trying to do it right,” Batman says. “Including going before the planetary councils, to seek atonement for her part in the invasion.” He watches John wince in pain. “They acquitted her, on a condition.”

“Oh?”

“That she leave the League, and never join another group like ours again. She is grounded, a civilian.” Batman’s voice is harsh, and John can only cover his eyes with one hand against the pain he feels. When he looks again, Batman is gone, and John realizes that avoiding fate has more consequences than just losing a potential son.

John has to use the monitor womb to find her. When he does, he wonders why she picked St Roch to settle down. He turns his leave of absence in, intending to do all he can to make things right for the woman he knows he loves, to get her back in the skies where she belongs, and back at his side. 

St Roch is a town of history and desperation, hard hit by natural disasters and corruption. John puts on his best civilian pose and garb, walking from where he landed to Shayera’s last known whereabouts. That turns out to be a community center, and he does not even have to go inside. Standing outside the fence, he sees the beauty that has changed his life, patiently teaching some teenaged girls how to defend themselves. She has her wings swept fully back, carefully trying to hold them out of the way as she demonstrates a hip toss. He watches, his chest aching to see her gracefulness clipped by her earthbound role. He starts to draw attention to himself, until he sees a small boy sitting on the sidelines.

A small boy with wings.

His first impulse is to rush over and demand to know who the child is, to demand an answer from the woman he spurned and ignored, taking the future for granted. As the self-defense class breaks up, he has the opportunity, but he holds back. Shayera walks to the child, picking him up to place on her hip, before curling one wing protectively around him. For just that instant, he wishes he were an artist like his co-Lantern, Kyle. The look of tender maternal instinct on Shayera’s face is unmistakably the most beautiful look he has ever seen. John cannot breach that, not when he has caused her so much pain. He walks away, hoping she does not see him.

Once he is in an alley, he powers up, and opens a communication to Batman.

“What?” the Dark Knight asks.

“You knew, didn’t you? About the kid?” John demands.

“A Thanagarian orphan she found on her last deep space mission,” Batman provides. “Rea Ex’Tor is his Thanagarian name. She calls him Rex.”

“Sonuva….” John cannot quite contain the angry cursing he lets loose. When he is done, he realizes Batman cut him out of the comm link to be miserable alone.

John spends all of a week weighing the ramifications of Shayera’s civilian life, especially the son she is raising alone. Mari notes his distraction, feels him pulling back from their relationship, and cannot do much more than try to win him back over. Nothing seems to work, and one day, she is just gone. His apartment rings with the echoes of emptiness, and it is more than he can tolerate, having grown accustomed to having someone. He knows it is time to face his fate, and live up to what he should have been all along.

With a decision made, he needs a plan. All good marines have plans, and back up plans. That is one reason he and Batman work fairly well together. John just could not see himself dropping right into Shayera’s life and saying ‘Hi’. If anything, it would earn him a severe beating from the warrior woman.

“You never know until you try,” John says to himself, as no plan other than that presents itself. He heads out to go buy chocolates and flowers, then flies over to St. Roch to see how cool a reception he gets from the woman he never stopped loving.

He finds the community center again, and makes himself walk inside. When he does, he recognizes the woman at the desk as one that Hawkgirl had personally saved during a League emergency. That explains how Shayera likely got a job so quickly after turning herself over for justice. That thought still makes his jaw clench, but he forces the anger down to talk to the woman.

“Ma’am, I’m looking for Shayera Thal. Name’s John Stewart.” He manages to smile, and look nice.

“Oh, I know who you are. And I am afraid that Shayera is neither here nor wishes to see you, Mister Stewart. Thank you for stopping by.” Her cool dismissal of him hurts almost as much as her words.

“But…”

“No buts, hero boy. Shay is trying to get her life straight, and doesn’t want your pitying interference. Now leave, or I will call security.” Her eyes coolly cut through him, until he walks out in frustration.

John knows he needs someone else’s help on this one. Batman is being a dick, though, obviously taking Shayera’s side and rubbing John’s nose in how he has screwed up. Diana never really came back around to being warm to Shayera; some said she felt the betrayal as strongly as John for her own personal reasons. Superman…that’s a joke. From all he knows of the Boy Scout, he has a hard enough time keeping his relationship with Lois Lane afloat. Wally has never been the best when it came to taking things seriously, and this is a matter of very serious proportions in John’s life. That only leaves him J’onn, of the ones there from the beginning, and J’onn did leave an invitation to them all to stop by and see him, anytime.

It’s off to China, and a quiet landing in the Communist country, outside this modest little home in a small city. His knock receives a quiet word of Chinese, before the door opens to reveal the little woman that J’onn had fallen for.

“Oh…Green Lantern?” She recognizes his emblem, or maybe J’onn has shared intimate details of the hero path with his wife.

“Yes ma’am. Is your husband home?” He feels awkward; he really should have called ahead.

“Come in,” she says as she nods. Quietly, for everything about this home is quiet, they go to a room full of artifacts and books. J’onn has an identity as an archaeologist, using Martian science to aid his study of Earth’s past. The little Chinese man there looks up and smiles warmly, coming around a worktable to clasp John’s shoulder with that unearthly strength.

“What brings you, old friend?” he asks, indicating the chairs they can sit in. John draws in a deep breath, and then he starts the entire tale, even the parts J’onn knew, so that he can be perfectly honest and get a perspective from his old friend. Through it all, J’onn pays attention, weighing all the words, and their emotions carefully. When it is all said and done, the alien looks satisfied. John sits slumped, unusually for him, in the chair, drained from relating his complicated history with the woman he realizes he loves more than anything, even his ring and power.

“You know the answer already, John.” The alien with a heart larger than the Justice League makes his friend meet his gaze. “You know what you need to do; you only came to be sure that you had covered all your contingencies.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” John tells him wearily.

“Rest here this night, old friend, and I will arrange the matter to allow you to do what is right and needed.” Again they match gazes. “And, you must prepare for the possibility she no longer is willing to enter a future with you.” The words are spoken with measured space, and John nods sadly.

“I was a fool, J’onn.”

“Most men in love are.”

`~`~`~`~`

He goes the simple route. The mighty Green Lantern remembers he is John Stewart and a man without fear. He returns to St. Roch and invests the time in learning where Shayera lives, remembers how to do the basic footwork of a case. When he reaches her door, he's holding a small present for the child, and a box of the dark liquor chocolates Shayera loves.

The first knock is far more confident than he feels, while the sound of running feet and laughter inside turning his stomach over and over. He wants to deny the fact his hands are sweating, but the quiet that falls over the house from his knock is enough to steal even his willpower.

The door opening is what stops him from fleeing, and he stands there as the shadows clarify to reveal Shayera. Her hair has gotten longer, he notes, and those eyes are dark with suspicion.

"John?" she asks softly, not opening the door more than it takes to peer out, one hand folded around its edge.

"Shayera, I'm sorry," he says, using the most contrite voice he can. "I was wrong, and you did not deserve the treatment, the pain I have given you."

"You went and talked to J'onn," she says knowingly. It did however get her to open the door so she could slip out on the porch.

"I know about…Rex." He does not want to talk to her out on the porch, and he does not like the way her shoulders slump at his words.

"Then come in, John." She leads the way into a quiet, clean house that had very little in the way of personal furnishings. He glances around, noting the complete lack of personality in this house.

"Shayera…"

"No, John." She guides him to the kitchen. "Let me talk instead. You made a choice, and I've made several. It put us on two different paths, and I don't think there is room for us both in one world together." Her words hurt him to the core, but he draws in a deep breath.

"I know. It's why I resigned active membership in the League, to come here. I can't relinquish my ring, Shayera, but I don't have to take the extra duty on top of it." His words are still ringing in her ears when he pushes the chocolates and the present to her. "Let me live in your world, and make one for the three of us."

She meets his eyes, and then looks at the presents. Her wings flare out just before she moves around the table to slide into his lap, carefully lifting those wings above the table level. He accepts the intimate position, running his hands up her back, reveling in the feel of the muscles there, as they meet each other in the middle for a kiss to seal their new beginning.


End file.
